What's wrong with making up a name?

[hopperdee]

I've met a couple of people with names made-up by their parents (one was called Thogdin but it does actually suit him). It might seem odd but if you think about it, every name was new or made-up at some point in time so is it so wrong to add a few fresh ones to the mix? Do you have a name that you've made-up and would love to use (but might not be brave enough to use)? or have you met any?

I read a lot of fantasy books, and the authors love making names up. Lots of weird apostrophes and consonants. Most often they include a helpful little guide as to the pronunciations. Which is fine if you are reading a book, when frankly it doesn't matter if you just skip over the names or substitute them with something vaguely comprehensible. But in real life that isn't really an option. Made up names should stay in fiction IMO.

Thogdin

Thodgin would be better, more gravitas to it. I'm off to google it. It must mean something...probably part of an air conditioning system or somthing.

I would personally hate to have a made up name. I have an ordinary name with an ordinary spelling and I am grateful. After all, I want to be an ordinary person!

Both my DCs have simple, common and easy to spell names. I have never received anything with a spelling mistake in for either of them. Nobody ever says "what?" when told their names. Their names are easy for them to write and spell, both names are used in all social classes and have also been used for hundreds of years.

I rarely actually laugh out loud when reading stuff, but i did at di'monae. Fuck me that's an awful, awful, awful name.

Yellowcircle - well done - thats exactly how things should be . None of this 'Nevaeh' type business!

Thanks!

Went to school with two girls (sisters) who had made up names, and they got a lot of stick for it, although this was 20 years ago and obviously it's become more common. Also knew of a girl in a local school called 'Baccardie' poor sausage.

In rl I HATE them, but in my tra la la head I think,why not?

Di'monae is truly cringeworthy. It isn't even pretty.
Poor child.

math why would you make a clicking sound for an apostrophe?

I quite liked Di'monae but not the way it's spelt. I'd spell it Dimone-maybe with an acute accent on the 'e'.

What's wrong with "Diamond" anyway? At least it means something!

each to their own I guess..Di'monae is awful..sorry..I think the problem with made up names is that you have to remember that you condemn that child to a life time of probable teasing...constantly spelling out name etc..

Oh my goodness - Di'monae is not doing anything for the cause of made-up names.

Depends on the name. I'm sure there are some lovely made up names. J M Barrie, who wrote Peter Pan, made up Wendy, because a child he knew called him her "friendy-wendy". I'm sure there are a lot of literary names where the name was made up by the writer. I reckon Shakespeare probably made up a few. But Throgdin!!

Di'monae

PLEASE tell me that was a wind-up.

Ooh! Someone mentioned me (not my usual posting name, but I felt called).

Problem with a lot of made-up names is it comes across as a bit pretentious, like your child had to have some super duper unique name that couldn't possibly be shared with anyone else (only it probably is).

And there's a reason that made-up names aren't ordinary names, they usually don't sound so good!

But when they do, fine. For years I thought that I had made up the name 'Katrina' (when I was 4).

I kind of made up DD1's middle name. It is Elabeth It is from an Anne Rice book where the character is callad Emaleth. That could be sorted to Ema and an old school friend was called Emma and we fell out. It does get lengthened to Elizabeth which bugs her.
Made-up names do not have to be chavvy only people with no imagination and foresight will pick a really chavvy name

See, now, I wouldn't choose Di'monae for my own children but I am not dreadfully offended by it. I think it's quite pretty. I am a teacher who sees all sorts of names from all cultures - at least it's phonetic!

Yes, Rebeccaruby, and wasn't 'Vanessa' made up as well?

Each to there own i say.

I highly recommend that you all take a look at this site and then tell me that made up names are not a bad thing!

Some of them are truly awful and make the children sound like strippers/porn stars.

A name has to come from somewhere (Pamela springs to mind as a made-up one that is totally mainstream (if a bit old!) now) - so why not. I really don't like some already-out-there names, so the jury's out on any new one, I reckon.

Also, we did sort of muck around with a name for dd1, but everyone seems to love it - to our faces at least!

Di'monae? Thogdin? I can assure you they'll have a lot of trouble having their CVs read by anyone.

I think parents should think about these things when naming their kids (not to mention having to explain to every single person why they have a weird sound/bunch of letters as name).

Hey if making names up is "cool" can I be the first to suggest:

Khyfsthu
Rykdyo
Aegjkby

[bangs head against the table emotcion]